‘Dhoni wasn’t selected for Pakistan tour as Ganguly hadn’t seen him play’

Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s biopic ‘MS Dhoni: The Untold Story’ was released in 2016. Even the makers of that blockbuster Bollywood movie can’t claim that they covered every ‘untold’ story related to Dhoni despite being guided by the man himself.

To be fair, no one can. Such has been Dhoni’s contribution to Indian cricket and his far-reached impact that it is almost impossible to do justice to him with adjectives. The only other Indian cricketer who perhaps had a similar or maybe greater impact was Dhoni’s childhood hero Sachin Tendulkar.

Tendulkar and Dhoni had little in common as far as cricketing skills are concerned – the former was like a batting manual, going about his business in an awe-inspiring way year after year the latter, on the other hand, was as far from textbook cricket as possible and yet so successful. But their off-the-field demeanour was quite similar. Many believe this is one of the major reasons behind their stature in world cricket.

While both Tendulkar and Dhoni’s life away from the cricket field still attracts the same attention, the sense of mystery attached to the former wicketkeeper makes it more interesting. There is always that ‘what next’ factor with Dhoni. He is not one of the greatest captains for no reason.

Dhoni’s cricketing journey is nothing short of a fairytale. The man from Ranchi, who watched the likes of Yuvraj Singh, Virender Sehwag, and Harbhajan Singh on TV during the 2003 World Cup, led the same players to a historic victory four years later in the inaugural edition of the T20 World Cup.

During Dhoni’s nearly two decades-long illustrious career at the top level – he still leads the Chennai Super Kings in IPL – there have countless tales about his journey and greatness. And yet there is plenty untold. Former India keeper-batter, Syed Saba Karim, recently revealed one such instance when he met Dhoni for the first time and became familiar with his skillsets after becoming a selector for Bihar in the Ranji Trophy.

Karim said Dhoni always had the power to hit big shots but it was his keeping that needed some work.

The first impression of MS Dhoni the power hitter

“The first time I saw MS Dhoni, it was his second year in the Ranji Trophy. He used to play for Bihar. I saw him batting and keeping, and I still remember while he was batting, he had that brilliance which we even saw later, playing big lofted shots to a spinner or a pace bowler. For wicket-keeping, the footwork that one should have, was lacking a bit. We worked with him on this at that time, and MS Dhoni’s greatness lies in this that he still remembered what he was taught then. When we would chat, he’d speak about it. It was a turning point in MS’ career where he actually got going. In one-dayers, we started to let him open because his batting was so strong and he used to get quick runs,” he said on Jio Cinema.

What fast-tracked Dhoni into the Indian side was his performance in a tri-series involving Pakistan A and Kenya A in 2004. Dhoni smashed sparkling centuries to convince the national team selectors that he was good enough to play at this level. The rest, as they say, is history. “The second turning point was the tri-series in Kenya between India ‘A’, Pakistan ‘A’, and Kenya. MS Dhoni got an opportunity to play because Dinesh Karthik was joining the national team. There, MS kept the wickets well and for batting don’t even ask! We played against Pakistan ‘A’ twice and he batted so well in the series.”

Sourav Ganguly is made aware of Dhoni’s prowess

Sourav Ganguly was the captain of the Indian team back and Karim recalled a conversation with the former BCCI president about Dhoni. “From there it was a turning point in his career and after that, his name was in the reckoning. I even remember I was in Calcutta at that time, and Sourav (Ganguly) was the captain. I went to meet him and I told him there is this keeper who should come into the Indian team because he was batting so well and was such a safe keeper. Unfortunately, Sourav hadn’t seen MS play just before we toured Pakistan, and he wasn’t selected for that tour. But he was after that.”

Dhoni’s blistering display, however, came a few months later after India’s historic tour to Pakistan in 2003-04 where Parthiv Patel was India’s first-choice keeper-batter.

Dhoni made his debut on the Bangladesh tour in December 2004 but couldn’t impress much. He took the world stage by fire when he was promoted to bat at No.3 in an ODI against Pakistan in Visakhapatnam. The right-hander smashed 148 off 123 balls and never looked back.

Ganguly, later revealed that after he saw Dhoni in the nets during a Challenger series, he decided to send him up the order. His breathtaking strokeplay convinced him that Dhoni can replicate the same in international cricket.

He retired in 2020 after scoring more than 17000 international runs and leading to ICC trophies in 2007, 2011 and 2013.